Outliers
by Zelling
Summary: AU. The other kind of time travelling detective. A question of fates intertwined, manipulations, deviations. Of love in all its forms, where maybe it's the only thing that ever truly lasts.


_**Disclaimer: All copyrighted content belongs to the TV show Elementary, it's creators, writers, and CBS. No profit is being made and no copyright infringement is intended. The same goes for content borrowed from The Time Travelers Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. All commentary welcome and beta-reader(s), even better - written in an evening in the back of a cafe on a tablet thus still needs revising .**_**:**

**_Joan is 4, Moriarty 18._  
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She feels the missed staircase step, stomach dropping with the air. Joan stumbled forward, falling

and found herself elsewhere.

The red brick buildings reached far above her head on either side, boxing her in to the alleyway. She flails, hands first in ground that is abruptly thick with snow. She notices this about the same time as she feels a chill crawl up her legs to make its way across her spine. She's lost her pyjamas somehow. Joan looks up at the near white sky, and knows it is winter, wherever. The fire escape above her head is a prospect, cold metal waiting with perhaps warmer balconies, but it is a little too far for her to reach. She wants to get off and out of the snow.

Joan wonders whether she is dreaming. She was walking downstairs to tell her brother goodnight, afraid he'd forget. She was about to fall, and then she was here. The alleyway is not wide, just enough to fit empty fire escapes and dumpsters. Joan looks around, curious, and sees that she is not alone. There is a man curled up in a pile of layers, one arm wrapped protectively around the leg of a trolley, snoring lightly. She remembers her mothers warning to stay away from men like that, knows that perhaps he is ill. There was something about illness being a reason for his being there, but she is not sure.

Joan edges past him, a little envious of his coat. She wants socks most of all, but she also doesn't want to wake him. There's a red cloth poking out at her from the bottom of the pile, and she tugs it, eyes never leaving the sleeping form. It comes easily, revealing a large red Superman tshirt. She pulls it over her head, swimming a little, but at least she's covered. Laughter floats on the air, and she looks back to the entrance of the alleyway, edging out slowly to the corner.

There are kids. She can see them laughing, playing on some kind of climbing frame behind a little fence. She considers joining them. She realizes once again with a shiver that she's only dressed in the tshirt, feet bare. There's a better vantage point from the hedge adjacent to the frame, so she tip toes over, quietly, a little embarrassed she's not dressed for the occasion. In what is probably a boys shirt too. The other kids haven't noticed her yet, and a glint catches her eye. It's Christmas tinsel, hanging from an apartment balcony across the way. She thinks perhaps they've forgotten to take it down, as her family has done once or twice, because she's sure it's not Christmas, not yet. It's just very cold, wherever she is, because Christmas isn't for another 6 months.

Joan watches the kids playing, contemplating when and if she can join, and feels eyes on her. It's an entirely different sort of chill from the cold. She catches a woman shift under her attention, had seen her for a shadow with that stillness and black coat. Joan isn't quite sure what to make of the realization she's not alone and being watched, and shuffles sideways, burying herself a little more into the hedge.

The woman takes a few steps in her direction, around the small gate to the park. No, girl. An older girl, about the same age as her cousin Clare (who's her favourite, and a whole 14 years older even). Joan looks at her again, and sees behind her head a Happy New Year 2006 from the ground floor of somebodies home. People must be really slow to clean up the decorations around here, she thinks, because she thought it was well past that. Either that or she's dreaming, but it feels too icy for that.

"You look a little underdressed for the weather".

Joan jumps, and turns to see the girl has made her way across to Joan's side. She looks up at blue eyes and a speculative gaze. She doesn't say anything, isn't sure what the protocol is for responding to strangers in what could be a dream.

"Where are your shoes? A sweater?"

Joan thinks, and remembers she was dressed in pyjamas not a few minutes ago. They were lost along with the staircase she was about to fall down. She looks down at her bare feet.

"I don't know."

The girl glances at her, at the ground, then appears to contemplate her navel. Joan notices for the first time her rounded stomach. She seems somehow to be unsure as Joan as to the merits of their interacting.

The girl huffs, and mumbles something that sounds like 'hormones'.

"You'd best get inside, get some more clothes. You'll get hypothermia, freeze those toes off".

She's a little gruff, but Joan's more interested in the new word.

"What's hyper-thermia?"

Those blue eyes are on her again, contemplating, and Joan feels a little like she's about to be weighed and measured.

"Hy-po-thermia. When you are too cold it's dangerous, for your skin to be uncovered. Are your parents nearby?"

Joan sounds out the word to herself. New words are sometimes better than chocolate. Only sometimes, though.

"I don't know. I don't have any other clothes."

Well she did, at home, but not here, wherever here is. She tells the girl this, who looks away at something in the distance, then back to Joan.

"I'm Jaime. What's your name?"

"Joan. Do you have any socks?"

"I'm sorry Joan, I don't have any socks. I'll give you my beanie though."

The girl, Jaimie, pulls off the black beanie that had encased her head, and Joan watches a mane of blonde hair fall out to catch the light.

"Thankyou. Are you sure?"

Jaimie looks down at her, beanie in hand, and a moment passes before she nods. Joan thinks it is kind and a little odd to be given clothing from a stranger, and then remembers she's borrowed the tshirt from the sleeping man.

She pulls the beanie over her dark hair, and is instantly a little warmer.

"Thankyou" she says for emphasis, to this girl who reminds her so much of her cousin.

"That's alright, Joan. People would be concerned to see you running around in the snow half dressed." A look crosses her face with the words, an uncertainty of her own inclusion in the general populace, that she's included herself by the giving. She shuffles slightly, and Joan sees once more that her stomach is really quite round. Joan has been told it's not very polite to ask, but thinks Jaimie might be having a baby soon.

"Where are your parents, Joan?"

Joan is not sure. She doesn't know this place, this enclave of buildings hugging a little park. She doesn't know how she got from going downstairs on a warm evening to making a new friend. She's not sure, but she thinks if Jamie is nice enough to give beanies, perhaps she'll be Joan's friend.

Jamie sighs, chews on a lip contemplatively, and seems to reach a decision.

"Well then. We'll have to get you to a phone to have them pick you up. I don't have my phone here but there's a payphone just around the corner." Jaime looks down at the little girl, appraising the situation one last time, before turning to stride away.

Joan startles a moment, realizing she is being left. She stumbles after Jaimie, keen to reach a phone so she can find her parents. The snow is reaching up her legs, and she sticks. A tug, two, three, and she calls out.

Jaimie turns at the sound, but Joan has gone. There is an oversized red tshirt and a stray beanie on the snow.


End file.
